Now there is plenty of PvP?
If there were plenty of PvP you would be asking repair kit patch. admin tried to have similar system for crew as there is now for repair kits. Many players on this forum told that they don't want to be sailing back to port all the time, "bound to port". Now you can still teleport crew to your ship, but if these PvP players had not been there I can promise that you would sail back to port to get more crew after every single fight.
Everyone on this forum can defend the game and tell how good it is. The game is dying, maybe time to think why and not just deny. Less grind, less craft, less economy, less gear influence, more action, more skill based PvP. What I fastly listed, it is actually pretty obvious list, no?

Pretty much this. Would not be even surprised if they just let the game die.
admin had "trusted" friends whose opinion he was listening. This was probably the biggest mistake as he was listening wrong people. When they started these radical changes, I think there were some people here on forum telling them to not ruin the game. They did not listen them, it felt almost like admin went in "block" mode and did not receive any input.
If there is something to save here it is going to be done with action oriented game.

Have been watching steam charts and slowly decreasing player numbers.
24-peak today 850, the last Sunday under 1000 players, Last 30 days 1097.
Maybe time to get back to 2016 and give us another server called "Naval Action Classic". That more PvP oriented game so many of us wanted?
Version to look would be the one before tournament. Of course this version would still need many obvious fixes done after. There are also changes that you have done that were already asked in 2016 but implemented years after. Also decrease amount of grind, easier economy, crew costs were insane this time, make it more focused on combat. Flag based system is still probably the best you have introduced so far. Old sailing profiles and combat that gave more room for small ships. Repair kits and crew that did support chained battles. Even consider bringing back ship capturing as a valid option for crafting. Multidura is ok or single dura with lighter crafting overall and (crafting cost/rate durability). Skill should matter more, bring back Powder Monkeys 2.5%. Oh and give back our child labor and sub crafting. This game could also easily have competitive tournaments, esports.
Give xp that everyone has earned so far in their whole gaming history. In this kind of more action oriented game it would be ok, especially when all ships will be once again end game ships. If that feels to much then a fresh start.
Maybe too late for this as there was already launch, maybe not. It can be that people come back for this action oriented game they always wanted. Would take time to put this together but you have all code in your version control.

I have to agree with everyone who stated there before me that big bonuses are not working.
You should go back to 0.5% and 1% changes.
I really would like to know what the F you were thinking when you decided to give 5 different port bonuses? One would have been massive and you decided to go with 5? admin, do you even play PvP games in general? Do you even play Naval Action? Are you really so bad PvP player that you love to butt R new players with your OP gear? Don't want to be offensive here but if you make every feature in this game to support this, then what do you want people to think about you?

Remove PvE from all plans. Forcing PvE for PvP players is a bad idea. You can do separated PvE content. The game is way too much about gear these days that I suppose it does not matter what I say.
A is good but as you already made ship building to be "big clans only", you made it much more difficult for small clans to be in competitive 5v5.
B because it gives a surprise change for small clans that don't own a port. If you really think this through, how can small clans defend vs something like this? Their port will be raided every night multiple times. Have you thought how a small clan can transport goods? They wont ever survive the trip, big clans will have zergs waiting them to exit.
Now going back to "Lets do content for small clans", you really don't think the big picture. If you want to take small clans in the game then change your port investments to support small clans and friend groups. Small groups need competitive ships to do this stuff.
There were years ago small competitive PvP clans. They all quit. There are no reasons to now think small clans. You have to change so many things you broke that probably not worth it any more.
Both ideas are pretty bad for small clans especially now after your massive port bonuses. I have told you many times that your big bonus fixation is bad for the game. It is still bad for the game.
If you want small clan pvp, then start looking back to history when small competitive PvP clans sailed the seas. As you are not going to do it, it is better to continue making content for big clans only.

Everyone should be able to build buildings in national ports owned by clans. Major benefits like shipyard crafting bonuses should be only for the clan and their allies.
Forcing people to bigger clans/groups does not have purpose, simply harming the game.

I wrote from "investments" long time ago and it got no support. I am surprised that you took it.
In initial idea clans were able to provide services to all, add some rent shipyard feature? Idea was also that there can be carpenters ship to decrease repair costs, etc. These were supposed to be something that clan can offer for others as well. Make hubs outside green zones. Give reasons to PvP outside green zones in the process. Also good reasons for players to leave green zone to these hubs.
Maybe buildings can also come with mission givers? This way a big clan port can be very important for whole nation to grind XP. In process players build PvP hot spots as well. Whole nation would be interested to defend it.
etc.

PvE trading is ok to have as long as it doesn't conflict with player driven economy or conflict is not too radical. Ship resources and crafting are part of trading. Ships if we want that people trade ships.
Crafter of your ship should get reward based on its combat success. You also see who was the captain sailing the ship to earn your crafters reward.
Something like this was tested before. This would work as an additional reason to craft and sell ships. This can include xp but also something that lasts over the maximum rank.
Not much realism in this one, maybe crafter gets famous and rewarded from building successful designs and ships.
Labor Hours should be the limiting factor in crafting. I am not saying that players have to wait days to craft. This will decrease resource prices but increase material/parts prices. I don't like that much the idea that crafting is limited by rare resources or wood types. Wood Types should be in balance. Some resources can be more rare than others but limiting too much will directly limit the amount of war we wage.
Crafting parts should give you crafting xp, this is mandatory, and crafting resources to parts will increase value of your products. We add parts crafting LH requirements and decrease ship LH requirements. This will make parts trade much more interesting? Neither you want high level crafters to craft parts as that would decrease ship production. This increases social interactions, communication. Time is money, LH is time.
Trade window should have an option to pay from crafting. One will pass resources to be crafted and reward, another will craft to get the reward.
When players were leveling crafing, years ago. They wanted to buy resources from other players. As time is money, sailing a trader has a very god damn high value. You produce resources but if you don't get enough money from sailing a trader, you only transport for your own needs. The money you spend to get resources could be zero or very close to zero in case LH were more expensive. You create value for your resources by using expensive LH. If you have no other use, you can always get resources.
If LH reals value is about 0. You transport your LH valued resources to crafting port. Your income will be directly based on resources prices in the port, is almost directly the income you get from sailing a trader. Very low cost resource production will decrease risks to move resources and increase value of sailing a trader, not talking from LH price here.
As some people don't want to be crafters they have free LH. They can easily exchange LH to resources and the only task left is to sail a trader, invest time, exchange LH+time to money.
You don't sail a trader to transport your free resources and you don't find anyone to craft parts for, you lose your free income. I could imagine that players want to use this free income in a way or another.
Player driven economy should have a bigger role than PvE trading.

Both have been tested and both have been a fail.
You are trying to make it possible for a solo sailor to survive but you have to remember that this is Gank Action not Naval Action. When 10 players gank 2 players and teleport to safety, well that really is some salty shite.
Like said so many times. They have to fix repair kits to give any hope for this. You have to be able to be in multiple good fights. You have to have enough repair kits to fight multiple fights. Old repair kits were making this possible why it was good.
Liq is on the right track there as well.
That 5 min timer before you are kicked out is not enough, it should be at least 15 minutes. 5 minutes is too well defined window, too easy and lazy for zergs.
You have to be able to tag for defense.
It has to end to a chase or it will be too salty for a party or another.
It has been already for a long time made so that Mass > Skill. Players with numbers for some reason has to always win. It is a nub protection. Because it feels bad to lose for a better and smaller fleet. It is much more safe to lie to yourself that you are a pro player and only lost because they had the numbers. Which sucks indeed. It only increased fleet size and took the game from Naval Action towards Gank Action.

50-75 meters would be much better. Players here on the forum has been asking 250m or something equally easy multiple times.
Notice that masts have now 3 parts. You would need to define distance for each part.
Another issue is that stern raking was made too good. If you fail to position yourself you can always mast rake. If someone succeeds to defend her stern, raker can always hit the masts. It is too easy.
Raking damage should be set so that if you get a clean nice broadside to side hull you take it. Instead the damage is always set so that players don't take these clean broadsides but instead they simply sail after stern in hope that the situation will change soon. There is a raker playstyle that makes players to do nothing else except follow that stern to rake. They may get that clean broadside but they don't take it. This is were the game has been broken most of the time.
Damage should be set so that you will take a clean broadside when you get one. If you get in raking position, then good, you will take it. Never you should skip a clean good broadside.
Another issue that has haunted the game has been that ships have been too maneuverable, especially when compared to rake damage.
They should also already increase horizontal dispersion that has been asked many times. It was already seen that everyone can start mast sniping with some practice. Not something that only good players can do.

I wish old tutorial were still available but the new one is there. That is not exactly PvP situation but takes us to the right direction.
Test it. You will see that hull bashing is the most difficult way to win. You can wait that devs make it easier. You will see that admin by purpose makes it so that with tricks it is easy to win. The previous tutorial was made so that with tricks every nub was able to do it. The same nubs were not able to do it with hull bashing.
So far admin has probably never evaluated how much skill it needs and base effectiviness on somewhat around that. Ships were even more agile than now. Cannons are really accurate.
Masts for example. There has been always players who win multiple enemies by dismasting and boarding. Because by purpose this was made so damn easy. If you don't have the gear or didn't know that this was defined to be the fotm, sucks to be you.
How can you hide your masts? How can you defend your masts with skill? There are maybe some very minor things you can do but pretty much nothing that you can do. Except one lazy way called gear. Gear or repair kits seem to be the answer to all broken combat features.
It is not about balanced options in combat, it is more like what admin thinks is going to be the meta for today. The combat model was in much better balance but the predefined metas has pretty much destroyed it. admins way is more like how efficient different things should be in his opinion, instead of trying to find balance.
@admin I am also really sorry to say that. I am not sure if you ever even wanted to balance the game and give us good PvP. I have no idea if you ever wanted to have another tournament or esports. Examples?
If you actually and honestly try to find balance and then you introduce Kirimati masts and Poods? How can you even remotely think that you can find a balance with these?
Repair kits? When one players has kits and another does not, how can you balance this? Oh, it was never meant to be in balance, you lose if you don't have kits? You have enough space to take kits for one even fight or go ganking.
Don't take it on just these two, it is full of your FOTM.
@Mr. Doran Admin pretty much indirectly kicked PvP players out by saying that this game is not for them. That is his final answer. After that the circus has been going on.

I admit that rake hull damage is high.
Your pdf file was nice. I read it years ago when I started to play. I think that many read it. Some parts were explained in slightly too complex way. It can be that I did not understand all. You could make a youtube video from it, I am sure it would be helpful for many.
Two players following the same algorithm but one is still always better. I don't think it is as simple as an algorithm. Much to out-smart.